by P. T. Hylton
When she reached the group waiting silently at the bottom of the stairs, she handed the book to Dad. A wave of relief passed through her as her fingers lost contact with the leather-bound book.
“This is it,” Dad said, handing it to Frank. “The book that saves the world. Or damns it.”
Frank took it, and Alice watched as he inspected it. He ran his fingers over the symbol on the cover. It was the rough image of a man with a crack running down the middle of him.
Frank said, “The one we saw had a broken world on the cover.”
Alice tilted her head. There was another book? A book like this one?
“I wonder what it means,” Sophie, said. “The broken clock on the Tools. The broken world on the book in Sanctuary. And now the broken person on this one. Why are they different?”
“Mind if I…” Frank raised the cover a hair.
“Go ahead,” Dad said, “for all the good it will do you.”
Frank opened the cover and slowly started flipping through the pages. “It’s blank.”
“Funny thing, isn’t it?” Mom asked. “All this fuss about a blank book.”
Frank handed it to Mason. “Take a look.”
Mason flipped through it, a look of concentration on his face. “It’s not blank, exactly. I can see, I don’t know, impressions? Like there used to be words here but they faded away or something.”
Now it was Sophie’s turn to flip through each page. “Blank for me, too. Maybe that’s for the best. I don’t have the best record when it comes to using these books.”
Mason looked at Dad. “You said that I used the book once?”
“Yes,” Dad said. “You holed up with it for a few days and eventually you were able to see some of the words. That’s what you told us, anyway.”
“Where’d you find it?” Frank asked.
“We didn’t,” Mom said. “Alice did.”
“We were out hiking,” Dad said. “All of a sudden Alice ran off the trail and into the woods. She’d never done anything like that before. We went after her and by the time we caught up, she was sitting under a tree, holding the book in her hands.”
“So what now?” Sophie asked.
Frank looked at Dad and Mom. “Maybe you should start by telling us how this all ends.”
Dad nodded. “You’re right. It’s time for you to hear my story.”
4.
It’s raining when Matt goes out the door. Normally, he’d wear a hat or grab an umbrella. Today he doesn’t care. Because today is the day the world ends.
He opens the back door to Sophie’s car and lets Helen get in first. He squeezes in beside her. Mason’s already back there, the big leather book, the one with the symbol of the broken man on the cover, clutched to his chest.
The door’s barely shut before Sophie squeals out of the driveway.
“It’s getting bigger,” Frank says, by way of greeting.
No need to say what he’s referring to. They all know.
Matt just nods absently. He glances down and sees the Roman numeral III tattooed on his wrist. This isn’t his first time. He knows how this will play out.
He turns to his wife and gives her a reassuring smile. He sees steel in those eyes. She’s handling all this much better than he is. Maybe she’s just a stronger person. Looking at her, he wants to weep. He wishes they had more time. They’ve had twelve years together, but it doesn’t seem like enough. Not nearly. He wishes they’d gone on more dates. He wishes they’d spent more time just talking instead of spending their evenings watching dumb TV shows.
Helen’s holding the revolver awkwardly. Matt’s doing the same. He wishes they would have bought holsters. On the other hand, he’s not even sure why they have guns. They had them last time, and it didn’t make any difference. The Exiles are bulletproof.
But it had felt better to go out shooting than to wait like he had the first time, just staring up in the sky until the fire devoured him.
They pull into the lot at Volunteer Park. The lot’s full. Matt thinks maybe next time they should set up some kind of carpool situation. The thought almost makes him laugh. Almost.
Sophie parks in the grass. It’s not like she’s going to get a ticket.
She turns around and looks at each of them. “We all ready?”
Everyone nods. She turns to Frank. “How ’bout you, big guy?”
He nods absently.
Sophie’s taking the lead. Usually it’s Frank who fills that role. Frank has a distant look in his eye and a nasty cut on his cheek. Matt notices Frank’s knuckles are badly bruised.
“What happened to you?” Matt asks. He saw Frank just yesterday, so whatever it was must have happened between then and now.
Frank doesn’t answer. Instead, he tosses something to Matt; one of his locks. He tosses one each to Mason, Helen, and Sophie, too.
Matt turns the lock over in his hand. It looks like a normal enough padlock, but he knows it’s not. Frank showed them yesterday how to use it.
Without a word, Frank steps out of the car.
“Last time he gave an inspiring little speech,” Helen says. “I was kinda looking forward to hearing that again.”
“I’m sure Zed will do enough speechifying to make up for it,” Mason says.
They get out of the car and move toward the riverbank where a crowd is gathered. There must be two hundred people out here. All of the people Zed trusts.
Zed pushes through the crowd toward them. “About time.” His signature smile is missing today. Worry lines crease his face. “The crack’s getting bigger. They’ll be through soon.” He grabs Willis Eddy by the shoulder. “You and Matt bring Rayd from the shed.”
Matt’s heart skips a beat. Willis nods toward Matt, and Matt follows him to the shed.
This thing with Rayd is new since Matt’s last time. Bringing one of the Exiles through that tree in the shed. The last time Matt saw Rayd, he’d been floating in the sky with the other three Exiles, raining hot white light down on the town.
Willis throws open the shed door. Rayd is tied to the tree. He’s recently taken quite the beating. His eye is black and blood is crusted under his nose.
Matt remembers Frank’s bruised knuckles and wonders.
They haul Rayd to his feet and untie him from the tree. They secure his hands behind him with a smaller rope and bring him out of the shed. The strange man can hardly walk. Zed told them he’d be weak from having been tied to the tree for so long.
Matt has to admit, capturing and weakening one of the Exiles was a pretty good idea. Now they’ll only be facing down three godlike beings instead of four. Still not the best odds in the world, but…for the first time today, Matt allows himself to hope they might make it.
They bring Rayd before Zed. Rayd chuckles softly.
“You could have lived forever.”
Zed’s face is stone. “Better to reign in hell.” He turns to Frank. “You ready?”
Frank scowls at him. “What about Jake? And Mason’s mom? And Sophie’s sister?”
“There isn’t time,” Zed says absently.
“You promised. You said if we found the book—”
“After,” Zed says. “We survive, and you’ll have your brother back. The rest of them, too.”
Rayd looks around, squinting. “I can feel the book. It’s somewhere nearby, isn’t it?”
Matt looks at Mason who is holding the book not ten feet from Rayd. He must be using his lock to hide himself.
Matt’s eyes drift to the spot out over the water. There is a black tear a few feet above the surface of the river, maybe three feet long and a foot wide. It hurts his eyes to look at it. It is a thing that should not be.
“Everybody ready?” Zed asks.
That surprises Matt. No speech from Zed this time, either. Maybe he isn’t so confident in their chances of success.
Frank looks at Matt and the others. “Turn on your locks.”
The crack over the water begins to shiver.
Mason
has the book open now, and his fingers are poised over the page.
Then, with a terrible ripping noise that chills Matt to the bone, the crack widens. Now light is pouring through, and three people step out. Two women first, then a man. The man, Matt can’t help but notice, has no arms.
The older of the two women looks down at Rayd for a long moment. “Zed. What have you done?”
“The book’s here,” Rayd bellows, his voice quivering.
“So it is,” the older woman says. “But where?”
Mason’s fingers are tracing the page in the book now, his hand moving slowly and carefully.
“Wilm,” Zed says. “You and yours have lived long enough.”
The older woman looks distracted. “Someone’s trying to use the book.” She turns to her comrades. “Do you feel the power pulsing out of it?”
Mason’s hand is moving faster now. He looks toward Zed. “It’s not working like it’s supposed to.”
“Mason,” Zed says, “I’m going to need you to finish now.”
Sweat trickles down Mason’s face. “I can’t…it’s not doing what it should.”
Wilm shakes her head. “Nice trick. You’re hiding things from me. People. The book. I don’t know how you’re doing it. But your man is concentrating too hard on the book.” She squints…directly at Mason.
Matt realizes she can see him. He reaches out and takes Helen’s hand.
“We’ve been patient,” Wilm continues. “There’s plenty of power in this town. We finally have what we need.”
“No,” Zed says. “Wait. Listen to me!”
But it’s too late.
The three Exiles move toward Mason. He doesn’t even have time to look up before they’re on him.
Zed is holding the compass now, and Matt knows he’s using it, asking it who he needs to send and when he needs to send them to in order to fix whatever went wrong here. Then Matt feels Zed’s hand on his shoulder.
The world dissolves into white light.
5.
Dad made Alice wait in her room while he told the story. They were always making her wait in her room. It wasn’t fair. She was the one who’d found the book.
And what was up with that guy Mason blowing her secret like that? He’d revealed her hiding place at the top of the stairs. It was like he’d seen straight through her.
She didn’t like it. It was too similar to that weird guy in the shed.
Ugh. That guy in the shed. She shuddered just thinking about it.
Whatever they were talking about down there, it had to be juicy. She lay on her bed, clenching her fists and wishing she could hear what they were saying. If only Mason hadn’t told about her hiding spot!
After a few minutes, she decided she didn’t care. She was going to listen.
She crept out of the room and to the top of the stairs. She crouched in her usual spot, but back a little. That way even if they looked up, if that jerk Mason looked up, they wouldn’t be able to see her. She couldn’t see them either, but she could hear them.
Dad said, “Then Zed touched me and suddenly I was ten years in the past.”
There was silence for a long time after that. It was so quiet, Alice was afraid they’d hear her breathing.
“That was the most recent time?” Frank asked.
“Yeah,” Dad said.
“Zed betrayed us,” Mason said. “He didn’t bring back our families.”
The room was silent for a long moment.
“You ask me, only one thing’s changed since then,” Sophie said. “Alice. Alice is the key to all this. She has to be.”
Alice felt her heart beat quicken.
“Now hold up,” Mom said.
“No, it’s gotta be,” Sophie said. “Look, Mason was born outside of time in Sanctuary, right? He could read that book and use it. He had a huge connection to that place. What if Alice’s the same way with this place and this book?”
“She wasn’t born outside of time,” Dad said.
“No,” Frank said, “but she was born in a—what did you call it—redo. In a strange way, she never should have been born at all.”
Alice felt her face redden. What were they talking about? Of course she should have been born. She waited for one of her parents to defend her.
After a moment, Dad said, “You’re right. God, I hate it so much, but you’re right.”
What did that mean? Dad agreed she should have never been born?
She had to find out what they were talking about. She needed to hear the rest of the conversation, the part she’d missed the first time.
She grabbed the rope in her mind and Pulled Back.
For a terrifying moment, it didn’t work. It was as if it were stuck on something. Then she pulled a bit harder and felt the rope move, and with it came a burning pain in her mind.
Then…she was somewhere else.
She blinked hard, trying to orient herself to her surroundings. She wasn’t in her room. She wasn’t in her house. She was standing on a street in a downtown. But it wasn’t King’s Crossing.
And there was a woman standing in front of her, a woman with curly blond hair and a wide smile.
“Hello, my dear,” the woman said. “My name is Wilm. You and I have quite a lot to discuss.”
THE BOY WHO FOUND THE WATCH (PART FOUR)
Santa Cruz, California
December 1956
Zed stepped off the train and onto the dusty sidewalk. The air smelled like salt and it tasted bitter. Over the past few years, he’d come to hate the ocean. He was born and raised on the plains of Kansas, and he felt all land should be like that of his home. Mountains and oceans were just being showy.
Zed had been working for Wilm and her organization for over eight years. He was nineteen, and his years of travel had left him weathered; he looked older than he should have. Though, with the amount he used the pocket watch, he sometimes wondered how old he really was. Had he paused time for a total of a year? Two years? If there was a book he wanted to read, he would pause time, and read the book, stopping to eat and sleep when the mood took him. He did the same for many things. If the swimming pool was crowded and he felt like taking a dip, he’d pause time moments before it closed and swim to his heart’s content. If he became ill, he’d pause and wait it out until he was feeling better.
He sometimes felt a little guilty using the awesome power of the watch for such mundane purposes. But if Wilm disapproved, she never let him know her feelings. Not that he saw her often. In fact, he’d only seen her five times since she’d hired him in the diner that day so long ago.
Most of his work for Wilm had been bizarrely simple and straight forward. He’d get his assignment mailed to him, always in a square white envelope with an ornate letter W as the only return address. The letter would succinctly describe his next job. It would always involve traveling to a new city and performing some minor task. It was often passing along a message that—it seemed to Zed—could just as easily have been delivered via post. But occasionally it was something slightly more substantial. Attend a series of public meetings and take detailed notes on the proceedings. Go to a town library and dig through the records in the local paper to research a certain event. The envelopes also contained a bit of cash that was expected to cover his expenses through the end of the assignment.
After the job was done, he was to wait in that city until further notice. He stayed in nice guest houses and hotels. His lodging was always paid for through means that weren’t revealed to him. He used his cash to pay for meals, clothing, and any entertainment. It was a bit nerve-wracking at times because he never knew when his next job was coming, so he never knew exactly how long he had to make the money last. But he hadn’t run out yet. After a week, or a month, or occasionally a few months, another white envelope would show up and he’d be off to his next assignment. Trust was a must.
It was a strange job in that, technically, he wasn’t being paid. His expenses were covered, but he wasn’t given any take home sala
ry. Zed didn’t think about that much. For one, he’d never had a job before this one, and—while he understood the concept of a paycheck—paying for his keep as he traveled around the country seemed fair enough. But, if pressed as to why he thought it was fair, he would have admitted he thought being allowed to keep the pocket watch was more than payment enough.
To Zed’s mild surprise, he had yet to be asked to do anything illegal or even anything that required the use of the watch. When he thought about it, he wasn’t sure why they allowed him to hang onto it. Either he was being groomed for some greater purpose or they had so many of these watches lying around that they didn’t mind giving them out. He doubted it was the latter. He’d been waiting for his opportunity to prove himself on a bigger assignment. And now, finally, it looked like he was getting his chance.
He’d been in some backwater town in New Mexico for two months when he’d gotten his latest envelope. The note inside had read:
There is a man named Henry Rankin in Santa Cruz, California. We need to learn where’s he’s been the last three years. He will be reluctant to tell you. Use all means at your disposal. - W.
Under the message, as always, there was the address of the boarding house where he was to stay. There was also three hundred dollars. The most he’d ever received in one of these envelopes by half.
Zed wondered at the amount. Three hundred. The same amount he’d taken from his mother when he’d left home that bloody night. Was Wilm trying to send some kind of message? Remind him of his humble beginnings? Inform him she had information about what he’d done that night? Or was it a coincidence?
Enclosed was a picture of a stocky man with a bushy mustache. The picture was yellowed and frayed along the edges.
Zed looked at the letter for a long time. Use any means at your disposal, it said. Well, he had quite a few means at his disposal. He’d been practicing.
